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Republicans scramble for new direction on health care

J. Scott Applewhite / AP

Congressional Republicans presented anything but a unified front on Monday night after Sens. Mike Lee and Jerry Moran announced their opposition to the Senate health care bill, killing it at least in its current form. Some immediately called for a straight repeal bill, while others discussed alternative replacements and still others acknowledged the party is far from being able to pass anything now.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell announced that the next step will be a straight repeal vote, with no replacement for the Affordable Care Act. That's what President Trump wants, even though insiders say it has no chance of passage in the Senate. "Republicans should just REPEAL failing ObamaCare now & work on a new Healthcare Plan that will start from a clean slate. Dems will join in!" he tweeted shortly before McConnell's announcement.

Contrast with this: "Thank god. Now the bill can die," one senior GOP Senate aide texted.

The White House quickly made clear it doesn't want Congress to give up. "We look forward to Congress continuing to work toward a bill the President can sign to end the Obamacare nightmare and restore quality care at affordable prices," said a White House spokesman.

What we're watching: If the party can consolidate around any particular direction. If not, things are going to get nasty.

What comes next:

House Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows: "Time for full repeal of #Obamacare--let's put the same thing on President Trump's desk that we put on President Obama's desk." (A reference to a 2015 repeal bill passed through the same Senate process.)

Conn Carroll, a Lee spokesman, on what he wants next: "Full [Consumer Freedom Amendment] or 2015 repeal bill." He's referencing an amendment he worked on with Sen. Ted Cruz, which was amended in this version of the Senate bill.

Sen. Lindsey Graham on his proposal to turn health care over to the states: "Graham-Cassidy is the conservative approach to solving the problems Obamacare created."

Sen. John McCain, who's recovering from surgery: "The Congress must now return to regular order, hold hearings, receive input from members of both parties, and heed the recommendations of our nation's governors so that we can produce a bill that finally provides Americans with access to quality and affordable health care."

The senior aide: "I will reserve judgment until after [Senate GOP caucus] lunch [on Tuesday]. Let's see what those two want. They are in very different places."

A second senior GOP aide: "How many more changes could possibly be made at this point. We're talking about people on the absolute ends of our spectrum. Every time you move toward one you move away from the other."

Self-driving lab head urges freeze after "nightmare" fatality

Uber self-driving car in Pittsburgh. Photo: Jeff Swensen / Getty

Carmakers and technology companies should freeze their race to field autonomous vehicles because "clearly the technology is not where it needs to be," said Raj Rajkumar, head of Carnegie Mellon University's leading self-driving laboratory.

What he said: Speaking a few hours after a self-driven vehicle ran over and killed a pedestrian in Arizona, Rajkumar said, "This isn't like a bug with your phone. People can get killed. Companies need to take a deep breath. The technology is not there yet. We need to keep people in the loop."

Why it matters: Virtually every major car company on theplanet, in addition to numerous startups and tech companies, are doing live testing of self-driving vehicles — and pushing policy officials to allow them to do so.

But Rajkumar said that ordinary people in addition to automakers and tech companies have developed far too much trust in self-driving technology simply because the cars have driven hundreds of thousands of miles with only one fatality before this — a Tesla driver who slammed into the side of a truck last year.

Quote "This is the nightmare all of us working in this domain always worried about."

House Dems say Austin bombings must be labeled terrorism

Police tape marks off the neighborhood where a package bomb went off on March 19, 2018 in Austin, Texas. Photo: Drew Anthony Smith / Getty Images

Democrats on the Homeland Security Committee released a statement Monday saying the four bombings that have killed two and injured others in Austin, Texas “must be classified as ongoing terrorist attacks and should be investigated as such.”

“For too long we have focused only on certain sources of terrorism and violence while ignoring others.”

What's next: The three Democrats, Reps. Bennie Thompson, Cedric Richmond, and Sheila Jackson Lee, are demanding to know whether the attacks are ideologically or racially motivated and called on the FBI to brief Congress before Thursday on the matter.

Police have said they're so far unable to determine whether the serial bombings are domestic terrorism. As Politifact points out, the definition of terrorism in the U.S. is not clear-cut across government agencies.

A few cases where the terrorism designation hasn't stuck: Dylann Roof in Charleston, James Alex Fields in Charleston, and Timothy McVeigh in Oklahoma City.